Little by little they wrung from us the fact that the friend of man, in the city, was a prisoner; was taken out for his meager exercise on a leash; was liable not only to many diseases but the one destroying horror of rabies; and, in many cases, for the safety of the citizens, had to go muzzled. Jeff maliciously added many vivid instances he had known or read of injury and death from mad dogs. (54)

A small, maybe insignificant thing to notice, but Gilman's gaze is acute and thorough, and she helps you to see the small details in the same way that she does.

Herland might not be the greatest work of literature; often the only irony in this didactic novel is Sir Thomas More's original use of the Greek word for nowhere to christen his novel Utopia. But Herland is a short read, and it's essential to an understanding of the roots of the genre. You can draw a direct line from the likes of Jonathan Swift to Gilman's Herland, and then from Herland on to modern works of science fiction like The Left Hand of Darkness (also Le Guin's The Dispossessed and Brin's Glory Season). Herland might have a few flaws, but its rediscovery only adds to the richness of science fiction.

What does it all mean? Russ is first and foremost claiming a space for women in what began as male-dominated genre. Interestingly, this particular edition is not packaged as science fiction, but my comment would likely apply to the mainstream context that Beacon seems to be targeting. In terms of science fiction, the call to write has been taken up by many, many women, to the point where equality in the written field only highlights the massive inequality in film-making, for example. The writers of today aren't necessarily going to agree with Russ' viewpoints and tactics, and that diversity can only add to the strength of the genre.

The Female Man also seems to be motivated by the sheer linguistic joy of it all; what has been called New Wave, but married to a purpose. Russ has some deadly serious points to make, and she puts an enjoyable, razor-sharp edge of sarcasm and wit on them. I know that some people have put aside the book because of its didacticism, but the writing in this book is too priceless to be missed.

Most of all, I think Russ is engaged in a gleeful smashing of stereotypes. How many times have female characters been slotted into the virgin/whore dichotomy? Viewed only as sex objects and put into passive roles? In one sense, the four women from alternate realities, including the fictional Joanna character, are only alter egos of the real Joanna Russ, as if to insist that any particular woman cannot be bound to any particular stereotype. Each of the four women have sexuality as part of their characters, but certainly not as their all-defining attribute as is the case in most stereotypes of femininity. In this way the structure of The Female Man itself parallels the overt sniping against cliché and such that Russ engages in with her linguistic fireworks. The intense, cumulative effect of this combination makes me wonder how stereotyping of female roles can continue at all. That a book should be able to change society is a curious idea, but society progresses through incremental modifications and a book like The Female Man makes its own changes (cascade effect, backlash, and so on), however small. Or by another metaphor: Russ' book is another salvo in the culture wars, between progress and the status quo, or between rebellion and tradition. I prefer to view The Female Man as a demonstration that wit and outrage can eclipse stereotypes and bad writing any day.

Tepper attempts to cover over a multitude of sins by calling the manipulative women's council the Damned Few. But the ironic knife cuts both ways; what if they are indeed damned and what they are doing is wrong? Or at very least, basing their actions on mistaken sociological assumptions? Tepper seems to throw off rational discussion when it would be most convincing, as with the foundational premise of the book. I think that intelligent readers can deal with uncertainty, and even something like irony. I realize that Tepper is deliberately fashioning a sledge-hammer, but I prefer an honest debate over being crushed to smithereens. Similarly, I cheer at the amount of scorn she pours on her target of militarism, but I think that her context and her solution are too simplistic. For example, The Gate to Women's Country uses the device of a play within the narrative, a play called Iphigenia at Ilium, dealing with the Trojan War. When considered as coldly as Tepper does, the events of the Trojan War are simply horrifying: the sacrifice of Iphigenia for good sailing weather, the sacrifice of Polyxena at Achilles' tomb, the murder of Hector's son, and so on. Western culture has many overwhelming problems, and Tepper has an easy job of tracing a few of them back to the patriarchal and bloodthirsty epics. However, the mystery of why such horrible things happen is not as easily resolved -- Tepper's answers simply don't hold up to the persistence of aggression and abuse of power in our civilization. And if violence contained in literature is part of the problem, why the cause-and-effect biological explanations? I am not convinced by such reductivist views of human behaviour.

The confluence of sex and violence drives the narrative of the story as much as the underlying perspective. Stavia is the main character of The Gate to Women's Country, a solid, dependable citizen of Women's Country, and a member of the Damned Few, the secretive inner Council. The story begins with a confrontation between Stavia and her fifteen year old son, David, when he chooses to renounce forever Women's Country (and the chance to become a civilized and educated "servitor") and become a warrior. About two-thirds of the book is made up of Stavia's reminiscences of her life at the time of David's conception. As a teen, Stavia fell in love with a warrior named Chernon, and instead of meeting and fulfilling their passion at the appropriate Carnival time, they run off together. This turns out to be a horrible idea, and Stavia has some appalling encounters in Holyland (where patriarchy has run amok). Rescued, she returns and raises the resulting child, only to have him repudiate her at his fifteenth birthday. For the following reason, which Tepper presents as cause and effect: David has true warrior genes from his father Chernon, whereas the Carnival is only a big trick where the servitors do the actual impregnating in the place of the warriors. By breeding women with "suitable" men, the Women's Council is orchestrating a giant scheme to eliminate violence. Tepper makes reference to Laplanders breeding docile reindeer, but humans have a more complex social apparatus than reindeer. The Women's Council also uses a certain amount of social control, but why then send out the boys to barracks at the impressionable period of five to fifteen? Without convincing sociological assumptions, the book fails at its apparent task of deconstructing violence and its link with sex/gender.

I must confess that I'm no longer a Tepper fan. That's as may be, but I still admire The Gate to Women's Country for its frank look at certain undeniable problems. That look may or may not be completely wrong-headed, but the debate itself is also important.

Please see the Challenging Destiny web site for a review of Halfway Human by Carolyn Ives Gilman, which is perhaps my favourite book of the last few years. I could have included many other works of science fiction in this column, from the Connie Willis short story, "Even the Queen," to novels by Suzy McKee Charnas, Joan Slonczewski, Octavia E. Butler, and so on. No shortage of controversial and intriguing real life stories too; for example, a look at the life of Alice Sheldon (also known as James Tiptree Jr.) would merit a separate column. The wealth of this kind of material in the genre would make a despairing utopian like Charlotte Perkins Gilman regain her faith.

Part 2 of this column will be called Feminist SF: Mainstream Invaders, where I will look at how "mainstream" writers like Atwood, Lessing, Acker, and Piercy have used the genre for their own purposes.

James Schellenberg lives in southern Ontario. He doesn't personally know any assassins (female or otherwise), tank operators, androgynes, parthenogenetically reproducing women, or men who could be held responsible for nuclear war.